Advertisement
Published: December 28th 2006
Edit Blog Post
You really CAN do it all in New Zealand...ocean, mountains, rivers, farmland...
In just two weeks, we covered a significant portion of the south island (save the southwest corner). We hiked, fished, ate and drank like kings and queens, climbed a glacier, kayaked in a national park & just plain enjoyed ourselves! And YES - the sights were just as glorious and astounding as depicted in the Lord of the Rings.
Queenstown: What a picturesque and quaint city! Queenstown is situated on a lake under some rather large mountains and is a jumping off point for many outdoor activities in this part of New Zealand. Most of the wine produced here is of the Pinot Noir variety - and the wine bars and hip restaurants do a pretty good job of selling it! We went straight here upon entering New Zealand to meet up with our friends, Chuck and Kelly for a night before hitting the Milford Sound...details on that below...
The Milford Sound Track: This portion of the trip required the most advanced planning of anywhere we've been thus far...The Milford Track is a 3 night hut-to-hut hiking (or "tramping" as the Kiwis call it!)
and camping trip that covers 33.4 miles of high and low ground finally arrving at the Milford Sound. Chuck, Kelly, Scott and Alyssa took on the challenge with signature style and grace despite the chaotic weather that ensued. In four days we heard avalanches in the valleys above, walked through at least a foot of snow that fell as we arrived, treaded through over 500 milimeters of rain (over 20 inches) that came down in one day, and took in a bit of wind and sun on our final day! Wow. This area is known for its quick weather changes, but we didn't quite expect all that we did. The trekking group in front of us was flown out by helicopter when a landslide caused by the rain wiped out a large section of the trail. We arrived just after crews lifted in emergency bridges and saved our trip. It was an adventure, and in many respects were lucky because all of the rain created thousands of additional waterfalls that one would not usually witness on this trek. We even got to see glowworms in the terrain at night!
Dunedin: Just a quick one night tour through
Dunedin. We sampled the extremely hip local nightlife and walked around the main downtown area. New Zealand´s first botanical garden, newspaper and university all came out of Dunedin. A college town in all respects, but is also host to an interesting Scottish-influenced history. Many of the buildings and statues reflect this, along with the commonly used phrase"Edinburgh of the South."
Christchurch: We had another quick tour through this smart little city. Simply not enough time in one place!! It really is a beautiful town with a small river running through the heart. Realistically, one could probably spend a couple weeks exploring this modern city. Like everywhere in New Zealand, there are beautiful vantage points to witness the mountains and the sea here. An international city with a population of over 350,000 - big for NZ!
Bleinheim: This part of our time in NZ was a bit more relaxed and spontaneous!
We took an opportunity to go wine tasting in the surrounding Wairau Valley and go trout fishing on three rivers with a guide for a day. We didn´t have much luck on the rivers that day, but we got over it after a nice
dinner. Most of the rivers were cloudy from the recent runoff caused by the storms. However we didn´t leave New Zealand completely empty-handed...we caught two nice browns in the Southland.
We really liked the B&B we stayed at in Bleinheim, called "St. Leonards." It was an old country home with a small farm and they had a great business model, hence the picture of the food basket. Like our predecessors (Chuck and Kelly), we had a run in with the rams there, with both of us walking away with scars. No kidding. Those animals are aggressive little guys! Nonetheless, it was a lovely place run by some very kind and gracious Kiwis. It made Alyssa think about her second retirement a little more seriously. Um wait, she hasn´t even been accepted to a law school yet...first retirement comes first.
Nelson: Yes, it is true. The original movie prop ring from the Lord of the Rings is housed at a jewelry store here in Nelson. :*)
Our time here was full of many exciting mini-adventures...namely assigned seats at the opening of the new James Bond movie at the small local theater, and a visit to the WOW
(World of Wearable art) museum. The first was great despite the critics view of the new actor cast for the part of James Bond (Daniel Craig) and the second was an impressive display of artists who enter an annual contest under different categories for wearable clothing. Scott wants his sister, Lindsey, to enter next year. And Alyssa wants her friend Julie to enter, too. Lucky for Scott, there was also a classic car show happening at the museum grounds!
Abel Tasman: Hello beautiful! Abel Tasman used to be privately owned land that an ornery old woman living on the premises decided should become a national park. So, in a rather unsuspecting move she contacted the Dutch government before the 300 year anniversary of when Abel Tasman sailed into the bay and told them that New Zealand wanted them to visit for the opening of the national park..."What!?" they must have thought when the NZ government received official documents saying they were honored with such an invitation. And so it became a national park all thanks to a relentless aging lady!
But besides that entertaining little story, Abel Tasman is a lovely park with great hiking trails and
vistas. It´s a great spot for kayaking and seeing wildlife.
Kaikura: The land of Jade! And, a sampling of "whitefish" (a local delicacy fish patty that is a patty made up of hundreds of tiny fish) made us believe we did just about everything we could in our short one night stop in this town. Kaikura has some unique local attributes, namely its proximity
Fox Glacier: Let's go climb 'em before they're all gone! What an experience. It felt slightly unreal to climb atop a glacier and some gentle ice climbing is something that we both mused would be a fun sport (as long as it wasn´t hundreds of feet up a waterfall or mountain face). We chose the Fox Glacier over the Franz Joseph because we heard it was less crowded and offered a more dynamic view. Once again on this trip we are reminded of the massive power of water, fluid or solid, and the way it shapes our earth. How beautiful, yet freightening to hear chunks of ice fall to the ground. All glaciers around the world are receding. What are we to do?
Thanks for your patience on this
one, friends and family! We fit a lot in to a small period of time and space (hence the plethora of photos), but it was well worth the constant movement.
We´re off off to London, England for a quick bit of time North of the equator next...
(p.s. More photos for your viewing pleasure on the second page...)
Advertisement
Tot: 0.32s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 12; qc: 71; dbt: 0.0564s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb